Teen Drinking: It's Not Just Their Pals You Have to Worry About

Below:

Next story in Science

Exposure to good parenting protects kids — even if the parents
aren't their own, suggests a new study that looked at how a
friend's parents influence an adolescent's substance abuse.

Teens in the study who had friends whose mothers were
authoritative (warm, but still in charge) were significantly
less likely to drink,
smoke cigarettes, or use pot than teens whose friends'
parents were neglectful (lacking warmth and control), according
to the study published today. The researchers controlled for the
parenting style of each adolescent's own parents, and they looked
at how much of the protective effect came from being friends with
a kid who didn't abuse substances. Surprisingly, the results were
only partially mediated by a peer's substance abuse.

"The majority of the effect of the peer's parents was direct,"
the authors wrote in the current issue of the Archives of
Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine.

"Adolescents' friends' parents matter more than we thought,"said
lead study author Holly Shakya, a public health researcher with
the University of California, San Diego and Harvard University.
Shakya said direct mentoring between a friend's parents and an
adolescent may explain the results. "A good parent would most
likely care about their child's friends and offer them the kinds
of mentorship that is protective against risky behavior," she
told LiveScience. [ 10
Facts Parents Should Know About Their Teen's Brain ]

Shakya and her co-authors examined data from the National
Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, which surveyed
participants four times, beginning in 1994-1995 when they were in
7th through 12th grade. They looked at this first survey as well
as the second round, which took place in 1996. The researchers
analyzed groups of friends, and they included results from 1,386
kids for whom they had complete data on their social networks,
their parents' styles of parenting and their substance abuse.

The researchers classified
parenting styles based on two dimensions: parental control
and warmth. This previously established model categorizes four
types of parents: "Authoritative parents are warm and
communicative, but they also exert appropriate control," the
authors described in the study, adding that neglectful parents
show neither warmth nor control over their kids. "Authoritarian
parents exert control while lacking warmth, while permissive
parents show warmth but do not exert control."

Adolescents who had a friend whose mother was authoritative were
40 percent less likely to
drink to the point of drunkenness, 38 percent less likely to
binge drink (downing five or more alcoholic beverages in a
row at least once within the last year), 39 percent less likely
to smoke cigarettes and 43 percent less likely to use marijuana
than an adolescent whose friend’s mother was neglectful.

The subjects rated their own mothers' parenting styles; previous
research has shown that that kids reporting on their parents are
more accurate than parents reporting on themselves. "Parents tend
to make themselves look better than they really are," Shakya
said.

"Previous literature has consistently shown us that 'good'
parenting positively affects children and adolescents," she
added. "This research suggests that the effect is not just
limited to the simple parent-child relationship but that it
extends out into the community, as well."

Aside from direct mentoring by their pals' moms, adolescents may
have benefitted from watching good parenting in action. Regarding
authoritative parents, Shakya said, "These are the kinds of
parents that will sit down with their adolescent and discuss the
implications of certain actions, and will be willing to listen to
their child. It is possible that when an adolescent observes
these kinds of interactions between a friend and the friend's
parents, that they too are able to benefit from the understanding
that develops from them."

Vetting your child's friend's parents could therefore safeguard
your adolescent against substance abuse. Parents should also be
aware that they may positively (or negatively) affect their kids'
friends, Shakya said.

Parents may want to also vet their teen's pals' romantic partners
as well, as research out last year found adolescents are more
influenced by the
drinking habits of their romantic partners' friends than they
are by those of their best pals themselves or their own
boyfriends or girlfriends.

Her advice to parents: "Communicate. Set limits. Be loving. And
know what your child is up to and with whom."